Pottstown fire chief seeks to incentivize volunteers

Pottstown Fire Chief Michael Lessar Jr. said he hopes to entice volunteer firefighters by establishing a financial incentive program for the department.

Volunteers make up 90 percent of the Pottstown Fire Department's manpower in the borough's four fire companies, a factor that saves Pottstown more than $4.7 million annually compared with a fully paid department of similar size, Lessar said.

However, the most active volunteer in the department responded to about 25 percent of the borough's 963 emergency calls in 2017, and most volunteers, Lessar said, responded to 50 calls or fewer.

"I don't have a lack of volunteer problem, I have a lack of participation," he told borough council at a recent meeting.

As such, Lessar proposed a points-based incentive program that would reward volunteers for responding to emergency calls and attending training programs, company drills and fundraisers.

"I want to take our fire department and I want to make it stronger," Lessar said. "I'm trying to embrace our current volunteers and hopefully recruit some others."

Firefighters would be able to earn $100 to $550 annually if they accumulated enough points to qualify. If every firefighter earned the maximum points possible, the program would cost Pottstown about $45,000 annually. But Lessar said the anticipated expense, based on the number of volunteers typically responding to calls, would be about $10,000 to $15,000.

The department averages three volunteers responding to calls of unconfirmed structure fires. For structure fires, that number increases to 20 to 30 volunteers.

"They're actually coming out when there's a fire, but when we get called for a fire alarm, we respond with the assumption that it's actually a fire," he said.

Pottstown employs 12 paid firefighters, who work in shifts, would not be eligible for the incentive program.

Borough council is expected to vote Monday on whether to move forward with enacting the incentive plan.

Councilman Dennis Arms, who later announced his resignation for reasons unrelated to the topic, expressed frustration with the idea of distributing borough tax dollars to nonresidents, who Lessar said make up more than half of Pottstown's volunteers.

"I realize we could be paying a lot more if we had a paid fire department, but when people here are struggling, they don't want to see their money going outside the borough," he said.

"That volunteer, who doesn't live in the borough, is actually providing a service to the borough, and that's what we're trying to reward them for, providing that service," Lessar said in response.

Charlie Pierce, president of the Phillies Fire Company, said Friday that the company has had its own volunteer incentive program for about three years, rewarding those who respond to calls with money from its own fundraising.

"A lot of the guys say the incentive doesn't make them come out, but to me, it's more of a thank you and showing them respect, more than a reward," Pierce said. "I don't think for a dollar a call that's driving them to jump out of bed on a cold morning. I think the reason they come out is because they're firefighters."

One incentive that Pierce and others have advocated for in the past is a program that provides municipal tax breaks - relief from either property or earned income taxes - for volunteers living in Pottstown.

Several other municipalities in the region, including North Coventry, Upper Pottsgrove and Lower Pottsgrove townships, have either enacted or explored such a program.

However, Pottstown Borough Council members expressed concerns over the potential loss of tax revenue. And Lessar said that such a program would not suit Pottstown anyway, because only about one-fifth of the volunteers own property in the borough, and those volunteers responded to a minimal number of calls.